There’s a sizable faction in Republican politics that wants and expects Donald Trump to follow through on his pre-election rhetoric and advance an unyielding anti-immigration agenda in his second term. There’s also a GOP contingent, largely made up of wealthy business interests, that hopes to convince the president-elect to take a pragmatic approach that would benefit the private sector.
The tension came to a head last week, with the factions targeting each other in surprisingly direct and caustic ways over the merits of the H-1B program, which provides temporary worker visas for high-skilled tech workers. Indeed, late last week, Elon Musk ended up publishing a tweet in which he urged many of the president-elect’s supporters, “Take a big step back and f— yourself in the face. I will go to war on this issue the likes of which you cannot possibly comprehend.”
A couple of days later, Trump tried to intervene, telling The New York Post, “I have many H-1B visas on my properties. I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program.”
The comments did not help matters. For one thing, as the president-elect really ought to know, he has not actually taken advantage of the H-1B program many times. Instead, he’s frequently utilized the H-2B and H-2A programs, which are quite different, whether Trump understands this or not.
For another, when the Republican said that he’s “been a believer in H-1B,” this was the opposite of the position he took up until fairly recently. As The New York Times reported, the president-elect was asked about his reversal during a brief Q&A with reporters on New Year’s Eve.
Mr. Trump was … asked why he had changed his mind and decided to support H-1B visas for high-skilled immigrants, siding with his political patron Elon Musk in a fight that Mr. Musk was having over the visa program with some of Mr. Trump’s hardest-right supporters. Mr. Trump, whose administration tried to suspend the issuing of H-1B visas in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic, insisted that he had not changed his mind.
“I didn’t change my mind,” the Republican said. “I’ve always felt we have to have the most competent people in our country, and we need competent people. We need smart people coming into our country, and we need a lot of people coming in.”
This need not be complicated. If Trump eventually came to believe that H-1B visas have value, fine. Officials and candidates in both parties routinely take one position, acquire more facts, and then evolve. Sometimes these so-called “flip-flops” draw partisan fire — especially when the reversals are the result of political convenience — but they’re hardly uncommon.
What’s striking about this example, however, is the fact that the president-elect is pretending that he’s been consistent on the issue. Reality suggests otherwise.
Donald Trump's shifting positions on H-1B visas. During his 2016 candidacy, for example, Trump called for ending the H-1B program altogether. While in office, the Republican suspended H-1B visas, claiming that the program was hurting American workers. He’s apparently settled on the opposite position — at least for now — which he’s touting while simultaneously claiming, “I didn’t change my mind.” If the president-elect wants to argue that he never actually believed his original position in the first place, he’s welcome to give it a try, but by pretending he’s been unswerving on the issue, Trump is bolstering impressions that he just says stuff, without regard for core beliefs. Worse, he expects everyone to just play along — that is, until he says the opposite stuff, at which point the political world is supposed to simply keep up with the moving target.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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